the comment
twelve o’clock, 11 August 2021 – 11:26
from Angelo Petrella
Land electoral campaigns cannot be separated from sport by now. Whether it is candidates for mayors, deputies, presidents of the council or party secretaries, every victory, every goal, requires immediate expression of support and jubilation. As if participating in the collective victory is basically belonging to the same party, sharing thoughts and visions of the world.
Nothing could be more misleading, opportunistic, vulgar, rude and even disrespectful for a citizenry that should be convinced by innovative programs and ideas, rather than by tweet consensus-catcher. How can you believe that yesterday’s visit by mayoral candidate Catello Maresca to the training ground in Castel di Sangro, where Napoli is in pre-season training camp, took place as a “simple fan”? Simple fans are the people who have booked hotels, trains, boarding houses months in advance; simple fans are the individuals who get into the car and face heat and traffic jams in order to snatch a smile and a photo from Insigne or Osimhen; simple fans are those who spend money to buy the – expensive – training matches on pay-TV, without advertising or personal spots.
Nobody questions the footballing faith of man, God forbid. And, indeed, Maresca’s Neapolitan ballonara deserves applause in the face of Manfredi’s ill-concealed Juventus (joking, of course … but not so much). What is contested here is the exploitation of something that belongs to everyone and for this reason it should not be bent for propaganda purposes. Napoli, football passion, Maradona and all that the team represents are certainly symbols of redemption. Precisely for this reason they do not marry with phrases such as “I hope to be able to create an alternative city government after thirty years of leftist disasters”, pronounced on the open cameras in the training center.
Politics in sport is something else: Socrates comes to mind, who came to Italy to read Gramsci in the original language, Smith and Carlos and the clenched fist that cost them their expulsion from the Olympic national team. The athlete Timanovskaya comes to mind, just recalled by the Belarusian government for having “dared” to criticize his federation. But at Napoli politics has always led badly: it has followed suit, it has tried to exploit, never to precede, by directing. We leave football to the fans. For electoral rallies, there are squares.
August 11, 2021 | 11:26
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